Just One Day(75)

By eleven o’clock, I’m falling asleep into my plate. The rest of the group drops me off back at the hostel before going out to hear some French all-girl band play. I fall into a dead sleep and wake up in the morning to discover that Kelly, Nico, and Shazzer are my dorm mates.
“What time is it?” I ask.
“Late! Ten o’clock,” says Kelly. “You slept ages. And through such a racket. There’s a Russian girl who blow-dries her hair for an hour every day. I waited for you to see if you wanted to come with us. We’re all going to Père Lachaise Cemetery today. We’re going to have a picnic. Which sounds bloody morbid to me, but apparently French people do it all the time.”
It’s tempting: to go with Kelly and her friends and spend my two weeks in Paris being a tourist, having fun. I wouldn’t have to go to dank nightclubs. I wouldn’t have to face Céline. I wouldn’t have to risk getting my heart broken all over again.
“Maybe I’ll meet up with you later,” I tell her. “I’ve got something to do today.”
“Right. You’re on an epic quest for macarons.”
“Right,” I say. “That.”
At breakfast, I spend a little time with my map, figuring out the route between the hostel and Gare du Nord. It’s walking distance, so I set out. The route seems familiar, the big wide boulevard with the bike paths and sidewalks in the middle. But as I get closer to the station, I start to feel sick to my stomach, the tea I had a while ago coming back to my mouth, all acidic with fear.
At Gare du Nord, I stall for time. I go in the station. I wander over to the Eurostar tracks. There’s one there, like a horse waiting to leave the gate. I think of when I was here a year ago, broken, scared, running back to Ms. Foley.
I force myself to leave the station, letting my memory guide me again. I turn. I turn again. I turn once more. Over the train tracks and into the industrial neighborhood. And then, there it is. It’s kind of shocking, after all that searching online, how easy it is to find. I wonder if this one wasn’t listed on Google, or if it was and maybe my French was so mangled that no one understood me.
Or maybe that’s not it at all. Maybe I was perfectly understood and Céline and the Giant simply don’t work here anymore. A year is a long time. A lot can change!
When I open the door and see a younger-looking man with hair in a ponytail behind the bar, I almost cry out in disappointment. Where is the Giant? What if he’s not here? What if she’s not here?
“Excusez moi, je cherche Céline ou un barman qui vient du Sénégal.”
He says nothing. Doesn’t even respond. He just continues washing glasses in soapy water.
Did I speak? Was it in French? I try again: I add a s’il vous pla?t this time. He gives me a quick look, pulls out his phone, texts something, and then goes back to dishes.
Con, I mutter in French, another of Nathaniel’s teachings. I shove open the door, adrenaline pushing through me. I’m so angry at that jerk behind the counter who wouldn’t even answer me, at myself, for coming all this way for nothing.
“You came back!”
And I look up. And it’s him.
“I knew you would come back.” The Giant takes my hand and kisses me on each cheek, just like the last time. “For the suitcase, non?”
I’m speechless. So I just nod. Then I throw my arms around him. Because I’m so happy to see him again. I tell him so.
“As am I. And so happy I save your suitcase. Céline insist to take it away, but I say no, she will come back to Paris and want her things.”
I find my voice. “Wait, how’d you know I was here? I mean, today?”
“Marco just text me an American girl was looking for me. I knew it had to be you. Come.”
I follow him back inside the club, where this Marco is now mopping the floor and refusing to look at me. I have a hard time looking at him after calling him an * in French.
“Je suis très désolée,” I apologize as I shuffle past him.
“He’s Latvian. His French is new, so he’s timid to speak,” Yves says. “He is the cleaner. Come downstairs, that is where your suitcase is.” I glance at Marco and think of Dee, and Shakespeare, and remind myself that things are rarely what they appear. I hope he didn’t understand my French curses, either. I apologize again. The Giant beckons downstairs to the storeroom. In a corner, behind a stack of boxes, is my suitcase.
Everything is as I left it. The Ziploc with the list. The souvenirs. My travel diary with the bag of blank postcards inside. I half expect it all be covered in a layer of dust. I finger the diary. The souvenirs from last year’s trip. They’re not the memories that matter, the ones that lasted.
“It is very nice suitcase,” the Giant says.
“You want it?” I ask. I don’t want to lug it around with me. I can ship the souvenirs home. The suitcase is just extra baggage.
“Oh, no, no, no. It is for you.”
“I can’t take it. I’ll take the important things, but I can’t carry all this with me.”
He looks at me seriously. “But I save it for you.”
“The saving is the best part, but I really don’t need it anymore.”
He smiles, the whites of his teeth gleaming. “I am going to Roché Estair in the spring, to celebrate my brother’s graduation.”
I fish out the important things—my diary, my favorite T-shirt, earrings I’ve missed—and put them in my bag. I put all the souvenirs, the unwritten postcards in a cardboard box to ship home. “You take this to Roché Estair for the graduation,” I tell him. “It would make me happy.”